recent decision by MNHQ

[NetworkGuy]

Please, MNHQ, do have a read of this thread and consult your Tech people so they can give you the answers as to whether your support for this campaign and the Minister's plans are worth going on with.

I would hope you not only reverse your position but assuming you get sufficient technical reasoning in 'Plain English', that you go public and explain how unworkable the proposal is likely to be. I feel sure journalists at Computer Weekly and Computing will be able to provide confirmation that filtering is a hiding to nothing and can be very costly because of the millions of GB of data flowing through the bigger ISP networks.

For anyone baffled, and wondering if I'm a nut case, this concerns a proposal to get ISPs to "filter out" all porn, unless a customer "opts in". For numerous technical reasons the idea is never likely to achieve filtering without blocking access to legitimate sites or not blocking access to better than say 95% reliable, thus making it a costly exercise in futility, while parental vigilance and filtering software at the home would still be essential for peace of mind.

(Incidentally the wording of the campaign page implies the parents need to ask, at the same time as someone wanting not to have censored content needs to ask - it is one or other, but not both that would need to contact ISP. )

[southeastastra]

what does this thread mean in a nutshell?

i hope it doesn't mean i can't link to the wetmen website for others to lust over

[NetworkGuy]

MNHQ "there will always be scope for a determined child to circumvent a network filter"

They don't have to be that determined when on the thread in campaigns, niceguy2 wrote how one could search for "how to bypass school filters" - I recommend you try that search for yourselves.

Without needing to be a whizz-kid, there are lots of ways to bypass attempts to block sites, so to be "determined" is not a requirement, just to "like a challenge" is enough, and in part, for the buzz of beating the system / school / parents.

Frankly I am glad my clients have mundane (applications related) problems rather than wanting blocks on thousands of different web sites.

Of course it would be possible by simply having a 'white list' and disallowing every other request, and it is how I will block traffic when I have staff, but is not a practical method for an ISP.

[KalokiMallow]

Agree with networkguy although I am currently childless, they will begin with zero net access, and then sites will be added depending on the content and the child's age. An ISP cannot do this.

[NetworkGuy]

SEA - in a nutshell the proposal so far from the Minister is to have ISPs block porn from getting to customer homes.

It is unclear whether this would just be websites or include torrents, newsgroups etc.

There's to be a meeting of ISPs (+ Mumsnet and others) quite soon in February, and MNHQ has added to the Campaigns page their support for this proposal.

It is not intended as complete ban on porn, because households could "opt in" for an unfiltered connection (ie what exists for us at present).

A number of users here on MN have expressed their scepticism of it being a workable solution, but if the ISPs are forced, then the costs will fall on the ISPs and thus, on everyone with an ISP (they will simply pass all costs for initial work and upgrades to us, perhaps as an extra fiver or tenner a month).

---

The Government proposes it, for ISPs to get on and do it. Presumably there would be penalties for any which did not do it.

I would prefer an option for some ISPs to say "yes, we filter for families" and other ISPs to say "we don't filter the data".

If that was allowed, then the cost of filtering would only be placed on those who wanted it, not those who don't want it and would opt out of the filtering (but probably be unable to opt out of the unwanted cost).

[NetworkGuy]

Oh well. Don't say you've not been told it might not work very well.

It seems (only spotted this today) that the Digital Economy Act (rushed through as it was up for debate on the day the date of the election was announced, so went through "on the nod" with few changes and very little scrutiny) has provisions which could allow for blocking of file sharing sites (as protection of intellectual property), but their effectiveness is under the microscope.

On Feb 1st, the Government asked Ofcom to review the provisions for blocking, in part to see if they are achievable, so there is clearly some doubt. Here are the questions for Ofcom:


1 Is it possible for access to the site to be blocked by internet service providers?

2 How robust would such a block be ? in other words would it have the intended effect, and how easy would it be to circumvent for most site operators?

3 What measures might be adopted by internet service providers to prevent such circumvention?

4 How granular can blocking be ? i.e. can specific parts of the site be blocked, how precise can this be, and how effective?

5 How effective are sections 17 and 18 of the Act in providing for an appropriate method of generating lists of sites to be blocked?

6 If possible, identify either a potential range of costs for ISP blocking solutions or the main drivers of those costs.


You can see from items 1 to 3 that bypassing a block is giving someone sleepless nights, as it would look pathetic if the law was made but could do nothing to prevent easy avoidance.

There was speculation that the attempts to close down Wikileaks, where some powerful government bodies acted together but failed, has shown how similar attempts to block file sharing and porn could be a 'cat and mouse' game with the authorities always a few steps behind.

I know the DEA is a separate issue, but it has broadly similar blocking requirements.

[NetworkGuy]

Someone mentioned www.the-cloak.com (and I have used www.http-tunnel.com to experiment with access to websites using a USA IP address).

In both cases the traffic from your browser goes to a foreign (US?) website and the lookup for a web site is done there. Data goes from that website to the-cloak.com or http-tunnel.com and then from those services through to your computer.

In the case of http-tunnel.com the data is encrypted. While decrypting data is not impossible, it is sufficiently hard that it is unlikely to be worth the effort just to see if someone was viewing an American TV site (where one may see clips of new TV shows months before they hit the UK) or a porn site.

Given these allow free anonymous browsing, and have perfectly legitimate uses (eg wanting to check my web site gives one set of pages for UK customers and a different set of pages for customers outside the UK) there is no way to ban them without complaints as to the justification used for such a ban.

[MmeLindt]

Ok, I do not fully understand the techy bits, and I guess that many other MNetter will not either. But as I understand this, it boils down to this:

• If my PC is locked down but my neighbour's is not, then their child can show my children porn.
  

• My neighbour's child can download and distribute porn on his phone.
  

• It does NOTHING at all to stop the production and distribution of porn, as those who want to access it will opt in.
  

Is this correct?

Child protection would be better served if the money was spent on searching for the bastards who make, distribute and watch child porn.

I don't believe that MN should get involved in this campaign.

[NetworkGuy]

Yes Mme that's correct about you vs neighbour.

The production and distribution is generally abroad anyway. The viewers would be the ones to opt in. Also to view sites which are not porn, but somehow match some of the criteria used.

Child porn is a completely unrelated matter, and significant punishments (rightly). What is still problematic for me is that if someone was sent an illegal child-porn photo in e-mail and at some point the authorities detected it, they are considered guilty unless they can prove their innocence. That's a complete reversal of our legal system and one I dislike (though have no sympathy for anyone who produces, distributes or uses child porn, and they need to be locked up for good).


Kaloki suggested that making tools available for every household to use would be better, such that protection would be offered to all who wanted it. The task of filtering (and selecting what is filtered/acceptable) is better at the home end of the connection not centrally, as it allows traffic to be sent without delays added by the need to filter, allows individual homes to have different settings, and does not need costly systems to be put in place and paid for by all, even the ones who would choose never to use it.

[ItsAllGoingToBeFine]

I can't believe mumsnet has decided to speak for me on this. What a load of bollocks. It is an unachievable aim and will just cost millions to no effect.

And since when do you accidentally come across porn? I have been using the internet since it was invented and never accidentally seen anything dodgy!

[Tee2072]

I also would like to know who these 'experts' are who are saying this is doable. Is it doable without costing the ISPs a lot of money that they would have to pass along to us?

What about ISPs that may not originate in the UK or Europe, if this is an EU thing? Because I would certainly choose a foreign ISP that didn't have filtering regulations on it, if possible, over a UK one with it, taking the money out of the UK.

[ItsAllGoingToBeFine]

ok, I just actually read the campaign stuff.

"Research suggests that 60% of boys under 16 have been exposed to pornography, either accidentally or deliberately."

This is surprising in how low it is. And I'll bet 99.9999% of the 60% was deliberate!

The mumsnet bandwagon is really becoming a bit of a runaway juggernaut at the moment. I joined mumsnet because it has a bunch of intelligent people who can debate an issue.

Recently mumsnet has turned into the oh my god, its going to hurt my child. ban it. ban it. ban it.

What about a bit of personal responsibility mumsnet?

This campaign is just embarrassing to me, and something I would expect of lesser parenting websites. I genuinely thought that MNHQ were savvy enough to do their own research, ask people who know, like Networkguy said, even ask their own Tech support for petes sake.

Sorry this is badly spelt, punctuated, and ranty. This ISP thing is a personal bugbear of mine, always touted as protecting the children, when in reality it is completely unworkable, and very 1984.

Shame on you mumsnet, backing this ridiculous campaign has made you seem very ignorant.

[Eleison]

It can't really be that ridiculous a proposal can it? I'm sure that MN will have done an amount of research. I wouldn't want to caricature it as daft, or to adopt a reflex anti-'censorship' stance.

But the many objections from all most all of the apparently extremely well-informed posters on MN do seem to be very telling (and certainly undermine any suggestionthat this is an MN user campaign).

[lessnarkypuffin]

DH was at boarding school and it was way more than 60% of boys if we're talking pictures rather than film. They rented out porn mags.

[Snorbs]

MmeLindt, the other big issue is that in blocking porn there is a very strong chance that other, non-porn sites will also be blocked either erroneously or because the definition of "porn" is too broad.

So if you as an adult want to access a non-porn but nevertheless adult site - such as lovehoney or b3ta - then you will have to opt-out of all filtering for everyone using your Internet connection.

[NetworkGuy]

Eleison - there are some similarities to the block piracy web sites proposals under the Digital Economy Act but if you look at ThinkBroadband here you can see that some ISPs suspect they will come up against Human Rights claims and are requesting legal scrutiny.

A separate ThinkBroadband article http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/i/4517.html about the "block porn" proposal says

"On hearing of the proposals, industry came back with mixed responses. BT said it would be happy to discuss the implementation of such a system but there are many 'legal, consumer rights and technical issues' that need to be evaluated before it could go live.

Trefor Davies of Timico was less keen on the idea and questioned how well a system like this could work. There are millions of sites that would need to be blocked and these are changing all the time."

[Snorbs]

Spam is a technically easier proposition to deal with at the ISP level rather than filtering access to adult websites due to the way email is transmitted and handled. Even then, spam emails do get through and you do sometimes get legitimate emails mis-identified as spam.

[BaroqueAroundTheClock]

I think the thing I'm Most uncoomfortable about this whole idea is of a blanket "opt in" "opt out" system.

So either I can access adult - non-pornographic websites - and have access to all porn.........or I can have access to no adult orientated websites.

Not to menion the fact that there's nothing stopping DS1's friend getting something on hi parents "opted in for porn" computer, sending it to DS1 o his phone and it being accessed that way.

[KalokiMallow]

Spam has been reduced in email. Yes.

However, any website with user produced content (eg. forums, social networks) can still contain spam, it is far harder to police. Spam and porn are two different beasts.

[Motherfunster]

"If a default filter option turns out to be unachievable, then of course we'll rethink"

Shouldn?t MN of found out first if this was actually a feasible proposition before lending its support to the idea, as in talking to the ISP?s rather that consulting with a MP on the matter.

Or to take note of the parts of the world where this kind of thing has been attempted.

[Snorbs]

Motherfunster, indeed.

A policy of "We're all for it until and unless it proves unworkable. Meanwhile, we'll ignore all the attempts at similar things that have already been proven to be unworkable" is just absurd.

I note that MNHQ still hasn't found the time to let us know which experts they consulted that told them this was a good idea.

[KalokiMallow]

You know the fuss over EE? MN got behind it because a large amount of users asked them to. So how come when a large amount of users ask them not to back something (haven't seen any threads where the majority are backing it) they do the opposite?